About

Overview

Delivering the most detailed and exhaustive content available, market-leading HEALTH CARE ECONOMICS, 7th Edition demonstrates how basic economic concepts, principles, and theories can be used to think about and illustrate various health care issues. This introductory economics text is geared toward graduate students who will be medical and health services managers, administrators, or executives. The seventh edition of HEALTH CARE ECONOMICS includes recent data on the medical sector, updated figures and tables, the latest information on legislative changes affecting this industry, and new literature and research. It also provides an insightful historical perspective within which these changes are occurring.

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Features and Benefits

Each chapter begins with learning objectives that help students focus on important topics, while chapter summaries reinforce key concepts.

Extremely relevant and helpful, the appendix to Chapter 1 provides a refresher on the basics of demand, supply, equilibrium price, price elasticity, and competitive and monopoly analysis.

Chapter on the demand for health insurance illustrates how risk aversion, expected utility, and the price of insurance are all related.

Emphasizing the policy issues under current discussion, Chapter 12 demonstrates the use of economics in analyzing the pharmaceutical industry.

An expanded section on Economic Evaluation and cost effective analysis is provided in the Ch. 2 Appendix.

Throughout the book, the author emphasizes the impact of incentives on patient, hospital, and doctor behavior--keeping the focus on economics.

Table of Contents

Preface.Detailed Contents.List of Figures.List of Tables.1. An Introduction to the Economics of Medical Care.Appendix: Review of Demand, Supply, Equilibrium Price, Price Elasticity, and Competitive and Monopoly Analysis.2. The Role of Government in Health and Medical Care.3. Health Policy and the Legislative Marketplace.4. The Production of Health: The Impact of Medical Services on Health.Appendix: Cost-Benefit, Cost-Effectiveness, and Cost-Utility Analyses.5. An Overview of the Medical Care Sector.6. The Demand for Medical Care.Appendix: The Effect of Coinsurance on the Demand for Medical Care.7. The Demand for Health Insurance.Appendix 1: Risk Neutral and Risk Seeking Behavior.Appendix 2: The Effect on the Insurance Premium of Extending Coverage to Include Additional Benefits.8. The Supply of Medical Care: An Overview.9. Market Competition in Medical Care.10. The Market for Health Insurance: Its Performance and Structure.Appendix 1: The Use of Medical Loss Ratios as a Measure of Health Plan Performance.Appendix 2: Developing Risk-Adjusted Premiums.11. The Physician Services Market.Appendix: How Medicare Pays Physicians.12. The Market for Hospital Services.Appendix 1: Using a Physician Control Model to Increase Physician Productivity.Appendix 2: Cost Shifting.13. The Pharmaceutical Industry.14. Health Manpower Shortages and Surpluses: Definitions, Measurement, and Policies.15. The Market for Physician Manpower.16. The Market for Medical Education: Equity and Efficiency.17. The Market for Registered Nurses.Appendix: Market Structure and Nurse Wages and Employment.18. National Health Insurance: An Approach to the Redistribution of Medical Care.19. Concluding Comments on the Economics of Medical Care.Appendix: Measuring Changes in the Price of Medical Care.Appendix: Health Insurance Premiums as a Measure of the Price of Medical Care.Glossary.

What's New

New “FINDINGS” feature highlights applications of research and current events, keeping chapter concepts relevant.

New material on the recently enacted Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) has been added to the appendix for the chapter on National Health Insurance.

An expanded section on Economic Evaluation and cost effective analysis is provided in the Chapter 2 Appendix. New chapter appendices are also included for Chapter 4: The Production of Health, Chapter 7: The Demand for Health Insurance, and Chapter 11: The Physician Services Market.

New interior design makes this new edition easier to read and comprehend key information.

Meet the Author

Author Bio

Paul J. Feldstein

Paul J. Feldstein is Professor and Robert Gumbiner Chair in Health Care Management at the Paul Merage School of Business, University of California, Irvine, a position he has held since 1987. He previously served at the University of Michigan as Professor in both the Department of Economics and the School of Public Health. Before that, he was Director of the Division of Research at the American Hospital Association.
Professor Feldstein has written more 70 articles on health care as well as seven books, including Health Policy Issues: An Economic Perspective on Health Reform, 5e (2011) and The Politics of Health Legislation: An Economic Perspective, 3e (2006). During several leaves from the University, Professor Feldstein worked at the Office of Management and Budget, Social Security Administration, and the World Health Organization. He has served as a consultant to many government and private health agencies, an expert witness on health anti-trust issues--including the case of the FTC v. The AMA, which was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court--and as a member of the boards of directors of several health care firms. Professor Feldstein received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.

Paul J. Feldstein is Professor and Robert Gumbiner Chair in Health Care Management at the Paul Merage School of Business, University of California, Irvine, a position he has held since 1987. He previously served at the University of Michigan as Professor in both the Department of Economics and the School of Public Health. Before that, he was Director of the Division of Research at the American Hospital Association.
Professor Feldstein has written more 70 articles on health care as well as seven books, including Health Policy Issues: An Economic Perspective on Health Reform, 5e (2011) and The Politics of Health Legislation: An Economic Perspective, 3e (2006). During several leaves from the University, Professor Feldstein worked at the Office of Management and Budget, Social Security Administration, and the World Health Organization. He has served as a consultant to many government and private health agencies, an expert witness on health anti-trust issues--including the case of the FTC v. The AMA, which was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court--and as a member of the boards of directors of several health care firms. Professor Feldstein received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago.